


life goes on

by HogwartsToAlexandria



Series: Marie's HP shorts 2020 [5]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Caretaking, Coping, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Insomnia, M/M, Nightmares, Post-Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sirius Black Free from Azkaban, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2020-06-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:33:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24080626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HogwartsToAlexandria/pseuds/HogwartsToAlexandria
Summary: For as much as Sirius had felt galvanized, driven, alive when he'd been back at Hogwarts, when he'd met Harry, when he'd almost gotten a hint of revenge on the man that took his life and gave it away to be destroyed, Sirius struggles to feel anything but emptiness now that he's back at Grimmauld Place.Remus does what he can to help him along, day after day.
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Series: Marie's HP shorts 2020 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1747861
Comments: 5
Kudos: 52
Collections: SOA Fest 2020





	life goes on

**Author's Note:**

> Here's my first fic back in this fandom for a long while. Hope you'll enjoy the read! Thank you to Erja and Flame for their support, cheering and beta-ing 💕

Sometimes he could still hear it, the wind. The brash gushes of wind that stormed outside and through the breaks in the walls that woke him up when he passed out, empty of all things that could have made him human. He could still feel the cold - even in the warmest of places, even when he sat huddled in a mountain of blankets, in a couch that had seen better days but still felt like too soft a place for Sirius after Azkaban's dirty, hard, black tiles, in front of a fireplace that cracked with fresh, magical flames. 

The cold would never go away. 

The wind either. 

Darkness would always live deep within him, and come back to the surface whenever, however, his mind conjured it this time. There was no sense to it, no words that his world, made of broken friendships, trusts and dreams, could contain. No words that could encompass the monster within Sirius. 

He understood Remus better now, he thought. Understood the pain of the raging hurt, of the forever-open wound of having your life as it could have been stolen from you, never to return. 

He'd never be who he used to be. Neither of them would. 

Grimmauld Place felt like a bitter kind of solace. The first place he’d ever tried to escape, his safe haven now that he'd managed to leave the last one he'd been barred in. Another prison he didn't dare call that out loud. Another prison to echo that of his mind.

"Here, I made you soup," Remus interrupted his staring darkly into the hearth of the main dining room.

Sirius didn't look at him right away. Instead, he followed the way Remus’ hands set the bowl of soup he'd indeed brought him down on the coffee table by the sofa, a tablespoon next to it. Remus's sleeves were patched up in various places, stained, with ink and various potion ingredients Sirius assumed, and there was a kind of comfort there, a sort of reprieve in their somewhat shared misery. It was selfish, and yet Sirius couldn't find it in himself to wish things were different. He didn't have the strength to picture what this excuse of a life would be if Remus wasn't in it either because he was too happy someplace else, with someone else - if he'd moved on from him indefinitely.

Remus sat next to him on the sofa, the cushions sinking, first under Sirius' feet, then under his back where he gingerly rested it. Then only did Sirius snap his gaze off the bowl and up to the side, to Remus' hands, that were playing with the hem of his battered shirt, to his face that looked both tired and hopeful, something Sirius had long ago left behind but which he thought he could still appreciate the beauty of.

He showed him his trembling hands rather than ask for help directly, and Remus understood. He nodded, as simple as that, and got the bowl and spoon again as he scooted closer and Sirius opened his mouth for him as much as the ache in his jaw would allow him. Thirteen years spent grinding his teeth from the cold, and the anger, and the despair, the pain would probably never go away. He couldn't really feel it anyway. Just knew he couldn't open his mouth more than he was doing now, and couldn't swallow much more than what Remus patiently fed him. 

Sirius kept his eyes on Remus' face, listened to the words that came out of the man's mouth without really taking them in, only a few of them staying with him,  _ "Hermione will come check up on you." _ ,  _ "depression" _ ,  _ "trauma, it's a muggle concept" _ ... Remus said those things with a grave expression, but his voice tried to give them a different tone. Sirius wondered what it meant. 

Past Pettigrew and the way Harry and Hermione had saved him, past coming back to Grimmauld Place and talking with Dumbledore, past reuniting with Remus and past the thrill of searching for revenge and finally being out of Azkaban, Sirius had lost most of his ability to talk. Losing his fight, no matter how much he'd thought out his plan, losing any hint of a trail of hope of ever finding Pettigrew again before the rat found his  _ master _ again, and knowing he was as good as a prisoner of his mother's house again - it had taken his voice away. 

Remus didn't seem to mind. He talked for the both of them, in that same gentle, intelligent way he had always had about him.

It took a long time to go through the bowl, but Sirius could never tell how long anymore. All he knew was that the soup grew a little thicker and easier to swallow as time passed and it cooled. All he knew was Remus met his gaze more the more soup he ate. Remus had always had eyes too deep for this world, eyes too deep for the fragile exterior people first saw when they met him. Sirius let himself fall into them then. It was comforting. Familiar even after all these wasted years. 

Even dead as his body was, drifting in Remus' eyes reminded Sirius of times long lost where he'd seen them even closer than this, even more expressive than this.

The spoon clunk in the bowl when Remus put it back on the table before sitting more comfortably, throwing an arm on the back of the sofa, his fingers just barely touching Sirius' shoulder on the side opposite him. Sirius shivered. 

The cold was still there. But Remus' eyes were warm. 

He knew what he was going to say. Knew the man wanted him to join him into bed instead of sleeping on the floor of the bedroom farthest away from where Remus stayed like he'd been doing these past two months. Sirius felt his chest heave as he once again reconsidered, ready to shake his head again, as hard as every other day he'd denied him, but his chin took the other direction. 

Surprise wasn't an emotion Sirius felt a lot of anymore. And he'd wanted to say yes from the start, but he also knew what his nights looked like, what his insomnia, and frantic shaking, and nightmares the rare times he managed to close his eyes looked and sounded like. 

"As Padfoot," Sirius managed to say, asking as much as he stated. He couldn't do it any other way. 

Remus' face stayed almost impassive, just a twitch that went through his cheekbones up to his forehead, a little widening of his eyes. And then he smiled - Sirius didn't think about why that felt more soothing than it had any right to.

"Come on," Remus said, getting up from the sofa and reaching for him. 

Sirius held on to his forearms as he unfolded his legs and let Remus help him up. 

"Tomorrow is a new day," Remus whispered against his neck as he hugged him before they both undressed, before they got into bed, before Sirius passed trembling fingers over Remus' cheek, before he changed into Padfoot and rolled himself into a ball against Remus' side. 

Tomorrow would be a new day, and maybe Sirius would breathe just a little better then, maybe, he'd feel just a little warmer too.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed this! In my mind, neither of them ever die because everything is beautiful and nothing hurts anymore, but you're free to keep the hurt going 😂  
> Thank you for reading!


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